


The Lines That Cross Over

by EthelPhantom



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Goddamnit why am I hurting my poor boy?, Hurt Tim Drake, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, This is why we don't let me write at 10pm, Tim Drake Angst, Tim Drake Deserves Better, Tim Drake Needs a Hug, Tim Drake-centric, please mind the warnings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:08:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22352335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EthelPhantom/pseuds/EthelPhantom
Summary: Tim could feel himself choking as he tried to cry,he truly did,but nothing came out and only the feeling of suffocating was left. He couldn’t take it. Getting strangled by opponents wasn’t that bad, not compared to this.He had no idea what to do. He didn’t know how to deal.Everything was just… too much. That was it.Too much.
Comments: 22
Kudos: 261





	The Lines That Cross Over

**Author's Note:**

> REMINDER IF YOU DIDN'T READ THE DAMN TAGS. SELF-HARM. EXPLICIT SELF-HARM. DO NOT READ IF TRIGGERING, ME VENTING MY FEELINGS VIA TIM ISN'T WORTH IT IF IT HURTS YOU. 
> 
> That being said, yes, this is completely based on personal experience. It's in no way representative of everyone, but it is my feelings that I gave to Tim because well. I needed another outlet. I didn't have anyone to talk to and this seemed like the next best option that I only remembered too late. 
> 
> My purpose is not to romanticise being suicidal in any way.

Tim could feel himself choking as he tried to cry,  _ he truly did,  _ but nothing came out and only the feeling of suffocating was left. He couldn’t take it. Getting strangled by opponents wasn’t that bad, not compared to this. 

He had no idea what to do. He didn’t know how to deal. 

Everything was just… too much. That was it. 

_ Too much _ . 

The family mostly ignored him in favour of Damian, in favour of everything else that wasn’t even that important. He couldn’t remember the last time they had noticed he’d tried to speak when the subject wasn’t a case. He couldn’t remember the last time anyone had offered him a smile just because they could — not if they were supposed to be on his side, anyway. 

And while everything was too much to handle and it hurt so bad,  _ oh god it hurt, please someone, anyone, just make it stop _ , at the same time nothing was there. He was just empty and incapable of feeling and he needed something to make it stop, to make it different. 

Anything. 

Even if that ‘anything’ meant having to be physically hurt. 

In a way, it was a relief from the what was eating him alive, what was burning inside him, but it was also a way to control at least one part of his life. There was nothing else he knew how to manage, but being able to decide how and when inflicting pain on himself meant he had the control. It wouldn’t be like when Jason tried to kill him. It wouldn’t be like when Damian tried to maim him. 

No. 

This he could control. 

If it was too bad, if it went too far, he could stop…

_ Right? _

It was funny how even though he was a vigilante and seeing blood was no problem for him, the very idea of taking a blade and slicing his own skin was disturbing. The idea that the scars would stay for a long time and he would  _ need to explain it to someone _ was too bad. 

That’s why he searched for his needles and took one, twiddling with it before getting some disinfectant and soaking the cold, sharp, thin metal in it. 

He would take the bit of extra sting over infections any day. 

It was funny how much care and thought he put into this, truly. 

Then, after twiddling with the needle a little bit more, he pulled his sleeve up. Tim brought the needle to his skin and  _ dragged it down _ , hard enough for it to feel and hurt, but not enough to draw blood out. He did it again, and again, and again, reveling in the sting and the pain on the skin of his forearm that felt like it was on fire. 

A hysterical, choked out laugh escaped his throat, quiet enough to not wake anyone up, but it felt like it was echoing in the otherwise so silent room. 

Again, again, again, line after line appeared on his skin, the marks looking more like a cat had lightly scratched him rather than anyone having tried to hurt him on purpose, with the intent of inflicting harm on him. 

Eventually, he could see blood prickling out from under his skin from maybe for of the tens of lines on his forearm  _ (he’d gone too far and those would form scars and someone would  _ ask _ , but Tim couldn’t bring himself to care, not right now), _ and Tim was torn between laughing and crying, and he had no idea which he could do. The now reddening and sensitive skin raised where he had scratched the skin. In the right angle, he couldn’t see it, only the bit of thinnest lines of blood. 

That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. 

He placed his other hand on his arm, nearly gasping at how cold it felt against the heated skin. It felt good. 

Tim sat down on the floor, ignoring the mess around him as well as he could, and placed the tip of the needle just above his ankle. Three quick, forceful scratches later, he could see a line of blood, and wasn’t it just hilarious how this was okay, but an actual blade wasn’t? 

What even was wrong with him? 

He had no idea. 

Another line appeared next to it. Then a vertical line between them and— oh, wasn’t that an ‘H’? It was, wasn’t it. 

More lines appeared. 

An ‘E’.

Then an ‘L’. 

And then, finally, a ‘P’. 

As though anyone would ever see them, as though anyone would care enough even if they did. 

He looked at the blood with a fond smile on his face, though he was sure that if anyone could see him right now, they would have said he was going crazy. Maybe he was, maybe he wasn’t. Tim wouldn’t use such a word, that would imply he didn’t have any control even over this one, simple thing, and if that was true, then that meant Tim was weak. Someone fragile. He wasn’t. 

A silent, painful, pleading cry for help was drawn onto his skin. 

A cry that no one would ever care enough about to actually answer, to actually reach out into the abyss where he was. 

The abyss most believed he’d already walked out of. 

He hadn’t. 

Every now and then, the surface was closer, and he felt better about going on about his life. On some other days, Red Robin ran straight into a fight without so much as a plan, or jumped off from the rooftops and fired his grabble a little late, hoping it were  _ too _ late. 

On some days, he hoped someone  _ (Damian) _ would cut the line of the grabble again so he could just fall and fall and fall and never have to see the damned world with his own eyes again. 

Finally, he pulled out his laptop and opened his work files. His job wouldn’t wait for his little useless breakdown to be over and dealt with, so obviously what he needed to do was to return to it. What else was he supposed to do? 

The material was cool against his skin and he jerked his arm away. He should have known. Getting startled showed how weak he was. How he couldn’t control himself over even that little thing.

No wonder the family didn’t love him. He was too weak, too much of a liability, someone, who hadn’t earned their love. 

When he heard someone walk past his room, he just quickly pulled his sleeve back down, made sure no one could see his legs if they came in, and kept on working. The sleeve stayed down, hiding the harm but not the sting, concealing the blood but not the pain, even if it hurt to have the rough material so very close — too close — to the oversensitive skin. 

No one ever came in, and no one ever bothered to care. 

That was fine. 

Tim had known he had never been a priority anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sorry?


End file.
